From December, free pregnancy tests will be available in 20 bars and restaurants in Alaska thanks to a bill which wants women to think before they drink.
According to Huffington Post, Alaska Senator Pete Kelly came up with idea in order to combat fetal alcohol syndrome.
The Senator suggested state-funded pregnancy tests in bars and restaurants so that women could find out if they were pregnant before they drink alcohol.
The bill was first suggested in March of this year. At the time, Kelly commented: “Literally, you can go into the bathroom at the bar and test. So if you’re drinking, you’re out at the big birthday celebration and you’re kind of like, ‘Gee, I wonder if I — ?’ You should be able to go in the bathroom and there’s that plastic, Plexiglas bowl in there.”
Apparently, Senator Kelly opposed increased contraception however. He added that birth control is for women “who don’t want to act responsibly.”
According to Buzzfeed, up to 5,000 tests will be distributed to 20 locations. Each test will be labelled with a prevention message and will cost the state about $1.50.
“If you have people who are binge drinking or chronic drinkers, we’re hesitant to say ‘use birth control as your protection against fetal alcohol syndrome,’ because again, as I say, binge drinking is a problem. If you think you can take birth control and then binge drink and hope not to produce a [child with fetal alcohol syndrome], you may be very wrong. Sometimes these things don’t work. Sometimes people forget. Sometimes they administer birth control improperly, and you might produce a fetal alcohol syndrome baby,” Kelly commented.
